


Freezer Burn

by absolutelysansational



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Childhood, F/F, Gen, Multi, Other, Pre-Undertale, Training, Undertale Spoilers, Waterfall (Undertale)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-22
Updated: 2016-04-01
Packaged: 2018-05-28 07:06:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6319486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/absolutelysansational/pseuds/absolutelysansational
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Freezer Burn is a fan created, fan interpreted look into the childhood of Undyne, a character created by Toby Fox in the game Undertale. There will, naturally, be a few head canons used in this story to keep it flowing, and the most basic ones that you need to know in order to read it are as follows:<br/>- Undyne's parents were erased from existence in an attempt to save Gaster as he fell into the CORE<br/>- Undyne lived with Gerson for a bit of her life<br/>- Undyne dealt with a lot of adversity, which inspired her trademark character we know and love<br/>- There is currently no Royal Scientist. Instead, the labs is run by a team.<br/>- Sans and Papyrus are Gaster's sons. Sans is slightly older than Undyne, Papyrus is a little younger.<br/>- Yes. Alphys is there.<br/>Why is it called Freezer Burn? Think about her kitchen. She has a hot fridge.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Not Just a Fish

**Author's Note:**

> Well, this is my first fan fiction. Here we go! Don't eat me, please.
> 
> NGAHHH!
> 
> This is just the first chapter, because I wanted to have Hotland have it's own little section, but ah...here you go.

“No, no, no! I am going to fight the king!”

I bounced on my feet, arms crossed over my chest. They didn’t believe me; didn’t think that a little orphaned fish monster was capable of doing much of anything, much less taking on the king when she had hardly even paid attention in school. I didn’t care much for learning about those boring subjects. What I really wanted to do was learn how to fight. The Royal Guard may have scared half the other kids in Waterfall, but to me, it was something I hungered to be part of. I needed it in my life more than some monsters needed magic or air. I dreamt about it, both when I was asleep and when I was awake. They were all so mean to me, though…they all said that my dreams were pointless.

“What are you going to do then, huh? Splash him?”  
“How are you going to take down the _king,_ Undyne? You’re just a baby!”  
“A little baby who lives with an old, stinky _turtle!_ ”  
“Yeah, where are your parents, Undyne? Did they not want you either?”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Their voices rang through my head, even as I ran and hid behind the counter in Gerson’s shop in Waterfall hours after their torment ceased. Gerson’s shop was small, but behind a few doors, he hid his house from onlookers with the most practiced of magic. He was able to make use of space that I didn’t even understand was really there. Typical of a turtle. He had a shell that he could just consider a home, and yet he still took the time to have a whole house hidden into the side of a wall and behind a shop where he sold weird human nick knacks he found…I didn’t want to know where. I didn’t remember my parents. I’d probably had some at some point, but where were they? Why was I alone? Why did it hurt to even think that they had just…dumped me? Gotten rid of me? Had they even wanted me? Gerson told me, time and time again, that whoever they were, they would have loved me, and they probably still did, if they were alive and hiding somewhere.

No. I was going to fight the king. I was going to prove that I wasn’t just some lowly little fish monster. This wasn’t going to tear me down! I wasn’t going to let some stupid kids make me think I wasn’t going to achieve my dreams! No! They could mock me all they wanted, but I knew they had to be wrong!

I pushed myself to my feet and grabbed the counter with my hands, puling myself up onto it. Gerson wasn’t there; he was probably negotiated some deal with someone else again. I only ended up in his house because I followed him around all of the time. After a few of my run ins with trying to beat up other monsters who really didn’t deserve it (like the mail man, oops), he took me in…probably just because he didn’t want more people calling him a crazy old veteran.

I squared my shoulders and focused every drop of magic I could into forming another spear. I wasn’t good at it, yet, but I sure could do it. I managed to conjure up the tiniest of spears, blue and vibrating in my hands. It wasn’t strong enough to take down the king! It would be a toothpick against his mighty fur. I scowled, shaking my hand and watching the spear vanish. I couldn’t just sneak into Gerson’s old weapon stash….

I could do that. I could just take regular weapons. Gerson had survived the war. He had weapons! Not big ones like the humans did, but he sure had weapons! I jumped off the counter and sprinted for the back of the shop. If there was anything I _could_ do, it was run. I was fast. It was how I out ran all of those kids when they said mean things to me.

I yanked open the door that I knew guarded all his weapons. The spears, the swords…some of them broken, and some of them in better shape. I immediately ran for the biggest sword in the room, but as soon as I grabbed it, I fell over because it was simply too heavy.

Solution: I had to be stronger. Much stronger! Not some wimpy little punk!

“NGAHHH!” I wiggled myself out from under the sword and tested my luck with a broken spear. That would work. I could hold it. It was bigger than me, but I could hold it! I blew a strand of bright red hair out of my face and gripped the spear. I would fight the king, and the king would know that I was no baby. Those kids in Waterfall would stop making fun of me, and I could prove to the entire Underground that I was worthy of busting us all out of here! Of course, that would mean that I would have to…not be so small and wimpy.

I would get the rest of the human souls so we could get out of this wasteland! I was not a fish meant to be stuck Underground my whole life! I wanted to run on the surface, be strong enough to suplex a building, and show some human punks who the real boss was! I wanted to feel the sun on my scales! Gerson told me it was big, and hot! Maybe I could wrestle it!

I slid out of the shop, making only a couple of obnoxious clunking noises with the spear as I tried to squeeze my way out of the door. I held it close as I started my run. I knew where the king lived, I really did! I’d been there before when I was following Gerson around before he first took me in so I would stop living around random corners in Waterfall.

I slid to a halt when the air started to get even more humid and disgusting. The air was hot, and I could practically smell every bead of sweat on my body before it even formed. My passionate thoughts evaporated, just like every drop of spit in my mouth as I inhaled that stinky air.

Hotland.

I hated Hotland.


	2. The Laboratory

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alrighty, here's chapter two.
> 
> Here's a bit of a somewhat shameful plug if you want to send suggestions or questions for this story. My tumblr is absolutelysansational.tumblr.com, and I use the tag #ASFreezerBurn for all things related to this. 
> 
> Enjoy~

I never thought air could be sticky, but that was exactly what it was in Hotland. It stuck to my nose and gills, making me more uncomfortable than I already was with all of the sweat soaking my clothing straight through. I hauled myself down the path until I came to a spot where I had a couple of choices. I didn’t want to stop moving to remember which was the right way; because the weight of the spear and the heat were teaming up to make me want to fall over. I kept going straight, up until I came to a set of doors.

It had to be the lab. Had to be! Maybe they would have air conditioning or even just a glass of water so I wouldn’t…die. I walked closer to the door, and it opened as if it had been waiting for me. I stepped inside, immediately thankful for the rush of cool air that greeted my gills. My grip on the broken spear loosened as I looked around. A couple of tiny desks lined the back wall, but only one of them was occupied. I knew monsters lived here, but I didn’t know who. There wasn’t a Royal Scientist, for reasons I didn’t understand, but I knew the monsters that worked here…kinda. I wasn’t the kind to pay attention when people were talking. What I did know was that Alphys was here an awful lot because she wanted to be a big name scientist when she was older…and that one of those skeleton brothers was here all the time, too. He was hardly any older than me, but I was taller, so that was all that mattered.

“heya.”

My immediate reaction to a surprise greeting was to thrust the spear in the direction of the voice, but there was a blur of movement, and the voice relocated to my other side.

“sheesh, undyne. what a way to greet an old pal.”

I whipped around and grabbed him by his stupid shirt collar. “SANS! I told you not to do that to me! Every time you’re in Waterfall, you do that! STOP IT, you little punk!”  
“ya know i do it…just for the halibut.”

I dropped him immediately. I didn’t have time for his snotty fish jokes! I needed to get to the king if I was going to make a point of this. I had to fight the king, and if this stupid skeleton was going to get in my way, I wouldn’t ever get there.

“Just tell me where the exit is!”

“Undyne?!” A slightly familiar voice cooed from the one occupied desk. “What are you doing here?”  
“i flounder just walkin’ around.” Sans chimed happily, before taking off down the hallway.  
“I need to get to the king.” I muttered. “How do I get out of here?”

I looked up at the monster before me. She was a bit taller than me, a beautiful Arctic Fox monster, all white fur and white lab coat, the only color on her, aside from her dark pants, was her blue eyes. How an Arctic Fox voluntarily lived in Hotland, I didn’t understand.

“Now why do you need to see the king, sweetie?”  
“I’m going to fight him!” I lifted my spear above my head, a grin cracking across my face.

She laughed. She LAUGHED at me.

“Undyne, sweetie, the king is very strong. He is very kind, but I don’t think you should fight him. He’s the king! You can certainly go and say hello, but why would you fight him?”  
“Just let me go!”

I ducked away from her and bolted. I didn’t know where I was going, but that fox – LUNA! Her name was Luna! – was not going to stop me from getting to the king. Nobody was. I could see a door at the other end of the building, and my feet were slapping against the cold tile faster than they had in a long time. Faster than they had since I was trying to outrun that mail man after I’d attacked him.

“W-Wait!”

That voice made me skid to a halt so quickly that I dropped my spear and nearly gave myself whiplash from my own hair flying out if its tie so quickly. I knew that voice. I snatched the tie up from the ground and yanked my hair back out of my face, leaving the spear where it was so I could gather myself and look less like a sweaty little kid.

“Oh! Hi Alphys! Sorry!” I said, so quickly that it hardly even sounded like words.  
“Where are you going?”

Her voice was quiet, almost like she was afraid to talk to me. I had a couple of inches on her, so she was craning her neck to look at me, but I was used to it. I grew like a vine. I liked Alphys. I always had. She was nice, and not many monsters were nice to me, especially ones my own age. Most of them thought I was too tall and too awkward; too stupid and too childish. Sans messed with me because he wanted to. His little brother was just an adorable little kid. Alphys, though? She was…genuine around me. I appreciated it coming from someone other than the old turtle I lived with.

“I’m going to go fight the king.” I said proudly, my hands on my hips.  
“Why…why would you want to d-do that?”  
“Somebody needs to know I’m not just a wimpy little punk.”

A long moment of silence followed. It made me uncomfortable. I shifted awkwardly on my feet, looking from my spear on the ground to my own shoes. I didn’t know how I was supposed to approach something like this, mostly because I hadn’t planned on seeing her here, or her making me feel like I shouldn’t do this…only because she didn’t want me to. I didn’t understand.

“Be careful.”

I looked up from my shoes at her when she said that, grinning with all of my sharp teeth.

“You know I’ll be fine!” I enthused. “I’m just gonna fight him! No problem!”  
“I uh…can I…g-give you something b-before you go?”  
“Oh!” I said, caught off guard. “Sure! What cha got for me?”

She walked over to a desk and I stayed where I was, leaning over to pick up the spear and fiddle with it while she did her thing. She came back a couple of minutes later, holding a small bit of black fabric in her hands.

“I…I made this f-for you a l-long time ago. Since all the t-tough guys have them.”

I took it from her when she handed it over, turning it around in my fingers. It was an eyepatch!

“Sick!” I cheered, pulling it on over my left eye, because that was the eye my extra flop of hair usually fell over anyway, so it was as good of a place as any. “Thanks, Alphys!”

She immediately flushed at my praise and padded off down the hall before I could say anything else. Luna was looking at me the way I imagined a mother looked at a child, or in this case, the way an adult monster looks at someone they know is an orphan. I inhaled slowly, turning the spear over.

“I’m still gonna go.” I said, turning around.  
“Just be careful, alright?” Luna said, walking over to me rather quickly. “You’ve got a long way to go before you get to the palace, and there are an awful lot of puzzles in the CORE. None of us know how any of them got there…so we can’t be much help. Honestly, we’re still trying to figure them out ourselves…but if you need help…do you have a cell phone?”  
“Gerson makes me carry one so I ‘don’t get lost.’” Not that there was anywhere to get lost.  
“Good…good. Then call me…or Alphys…or even Sans. He seems to know a lot about puzzles…mostly since his little brother keeps trying to make them.” She chuckled as she spoke.  
“I’m not gonna call Sans.” I muttered a little angrily. “But I’ll ask you or Alphys.”  
“Good. Stay safe, sweetie.”

I nodded, heading for the door. I was stopped, almost immediately, by that stupid skeleton sliding out of what seemed to be thin air. He looked up at me, his hands in his pockets.

“i could get ya there faster.”  
“How are you going to do that, huh?”  
“i know a few shortcuts.”

He winked at me. Stupid skeleton. How did he even wink? His face was solid bone!

“Okay, fine. What do I do?”  
“just follow me.”

He waved and I followed along behind him. We walked out the doors and around a corner to what seemed to take us straight outside of that big mammoth of a building everyone called the CORE. I looked up at it, my mouth dropping open. Nothing stood in the way of the bridge to it, just a lot of hot dirt in a space that looked like it could one day be useful for something. If I were in charge, I’d put a big, fancy battle arena there. With a hotel or something too, so monsters could stay after practicing to fight. We had to learn to snag up those last human souls!

“How…?”  
“a skeleton never reveals his secrets.”

He slid behind me, and then he was gone just as quickly as we’d gotten there.

I was never going to understand that bag of bones.


	3. Straight Through the CORE

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize for this chapter taking so long and being both short and rushed. I needed to get this chapter in for the sake of everything being chronological, but I PROMISE that chapter four will be much better. In fact, I am SUPER excited to get chapter four out, because I've been working on it for quite a while.

The CORE was big. The kind of uncomfortable big that made me feel even more worried with every step I took. The king was just at the other end of this maze, I knew it, but it wasn’t enough to make me feel as confident as I once had been. It didn’t help that I had a growing feeling that I was not supposed to be in that building; not because it was dangerous, but because I felt as if someone didn’t want me there. Almost like someone was hiding around the corner and worrying about me. Nobody worried about me except for Gerson.

Well, and Alphys.

I walked up to what looked like an elevator, the buttons too high up for even me to reach. I was a tall kid, but they were meant for adults to push. I used the spear to smack the up button, but nothing happened. At all. The elevator stayed where it was, not bothering or daring to move an inch. I felt a brief rush of fear as I worried that someone was going to come around the corner and apprehend me for being a bad kid again. Maybe one of my peers from the school, or maybe some big, lumbering adult.

But nobody came.

I squared my shoulders and took off down a hallway, ducking my head down and running, my spear held tightly in one hand as I sprinted down the hall, not wanting to deal with anybody or anything. I was on a roll until I felt my head smash against something.

I looked up and swallowed. The figure turned around and looked down at me as I looked up at her. She was taller than me by a landslide, and although she seemed gentle, I couldn’t quite tell where her face was; if it was the almost bird-like face I was level with, or the thing under her helmet.

“What are you doing here, child?” She asked.  
“I uh…I need to…get…through! I need to get to the Capital! Yeah! The Capital!”  
“What’s in the capital, darling? Wouldn’t you be much safer back home? The CORE is no place for a child, especially not when the adults are at work.”  
“I’m from the Capital!” I lied. I had to be quick on my feet.   
“Then you would have known not to come here at this hour.” She extended her hand to me. “Come on, let’s get you out of the CORE, hmmm?”

I hopped away from her and panicked. Who was she? I knew her, I knew I did, but which one was she?! She was dressed like a knight…a… KNIGHT KNIGHT! It was a pun…Sans would have a real ball with that. I couldn’t fight her, because all of my fighting had to be saved for the king. If I wanted to be big and strong, I would have to make sure I saved up all my energy and anticipation to throw it into that fight.

I’d always heard about how the king had a habit of humming some kind of old tune when he tended to his garden. I didn’t know much about his life, or if there was some reason for why he did it (I never paid attention to that in school), but other people had mimicked it. Other people had talked about it. I could do it; I could use it like a lullaby! Make her fall asleep!

I shuffled my feet and started humming. She looked at me curiously. She knew what I was doing. I could tell by the expression on her…face that she had heard this before and knew I was manipulating it a little bit. She started to look a little drowsy, but still made a move to snatch me.

I jumped out of the way and stood with my hands and spear behind my back, still humming as I stood there. Eventually, she fell asleep into a heap on the ground. Satisfied, I shut up and gently poked her with my foot to make sure she was really asleep before I took off again.

As I ran, I was incredibly grateful that the CORE was more so a well powered machine for the Underground than a complicated maze full of traps. Man, if Alphys ever got ahold of this, she’d have a real fun time with it! There would be all kinds of magical puzzles and lasers everywhere! Whoever, or whatever, had built this in the first place seemed to have taken a lot of time in making it a complicate place to walk through, but I was sure glad that there were no puzzles up yet.

I came to another hallway and another elevator. I looked down the hall, carefully, and then smacked the up button with my spear, hoping that it would actually open up. It didn’t. Big surprise. I pushed my way down the hall beside it, running a little faster because of how incredibly dark it was. This was not the place for a little kid to be, and I was starting to realize it the farther I went on. I hardly noticed that I was mumbling under my breath about how dark it was until the room suddenly lit up.

It was empty and rather bare, but I had no idea of where the light was coming from. At all.

“Okay…” I muttered. “Thanks…CORE…thing…?”

I kept walking until I got to another elevator, and this time, I took it straight up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still confused on what she was humming? Give the song "Memory" from the soundtrack a listen. 
> 
> This chapter is basically just a looooot of foreshadowing for what's to come.


	4. Someone's Always Listening

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay! Chapter four, here we go. It was even longer, believe it or not, but I chopped off part of it for dramatic effect and so I could have more "meat" to chapter five, I guess.
> 
> Enjoy!

I walked down the pathway, the giant buildings of the Capital on both sides as I made my way through. I hadn’t ever been here, but I knew that my best bet was to just keep walking until I found something that at least looked promising. The king had to be somewhere around here, and even though I could see pathways leading a number of ways to different houses, businesses, and other kinds of buildings, I didn’t bother to look at any of them. There was no way that the king would have his house or the actual palace surrounded by all of these weird, giant buildings. The structures made me feel impossibly small. Monsters of all shapes and sizes lived in them, that much I knew, but I didn’t think that any of them were going to be the kind of monsters that made moves to harm little kids like me…unless I chased after them first.

I eventually came upon a house, sitting alone at the end of the pathway around a corner. It seemed like it was either a very promising spot for the king to live, or some unsteady attempt at making it look like the king lived out there. I approached slowly, afraid to get too close to the building, even if it was just a house. I hadn’t lived in a house at all in my life, at least that I could remember. I’d hopped around the streets of Waterfall, running between trying to find somewhere to sleep out of the rain and getting to school. When Gerson took me in, that still left me living in the back of a hollowed-out cave wall that was hardly even a house. He always said that old turtles like him didn’t need much.

I wrapped my arms around myself, careful not to drop the spear or let it poke me as I got closer. I sucked in a slow breath, pushing myself onto my toes to look into the window. I didn’t expect there to be anyone in there, and no one was. I didn’t see anyone, and I certainly didn’t hear anyone either. He was probably outside tending to his garden or doing whatever kings did when there wasn’t a war going on.

I pressed my back against the wall, looking up at the roof, attempting to keep myself calm, even though my heart was pounding all the way up in my throat. I slid along the wall to the door, reaching out for the handle. It opened, which surprised me. Surely this couldn’t be the king’s house. He wouldn’t leave the door unlocked! He was the king! It was his job to be the force of security and demanding power, not to be the one who sat back and trusted anyone and everyone to just waltz into his house and have off with whatever they wanted.

I whipped around the corner and inside, yanking the door shut behind me as I did so. It slammed. Loudly. I shrunk for a moment in fear as I listened, my fins twitching a little uncomfortably as I waited for the inevitable. Someone was going to apprehend me. The king was going to get me before I was even able to surprise him. I stood there, frozen as Snowdrake, as I waited.

But nobody came.

I relaxed, letting out a breath that I didn’t know I was holding. I was in someone’s house. I was maybe in the king’s house. I look ahead of me at the house, which was mostly just a set of stairs that lead down to…probably his basement. What would a king need with a basement? Was it where he kept his big, kingly weapons and giant novels about the war? What did kings even keep?

I trailed my tongue over my lips, taking off towards the left. The living room and dining room were abandoned, a single reading chair still warm to the touch as I pressed my hand against the seat. If I were there with friends (Alphys), I probably would have hopped in to make some stupid joke about how big and mighty the king was, but it wasn’t the time. I was on a mission. A mission to prove to all of those stupid kids in school, and the king, that I wasn’t just some snarky little fish who lived with an old turtle. I was capable, and there was no one better to prove that to than the man who ran the entire Underground.

I poked my head into the kitchen, looking at the set up. I tugged open the fridge and jumped back, irritated at the rush of cold air that smacked me. I hated Hotland, naturally, but the idea of a fridge keeping food cold was just plain wrong. The fridge was mostly empty, set aside for a single chocolate bar, an untouched pie, and several cases of snails. Gross. I kicked the door shut and left the kitchen alone. The king wasn’t in his living room or kitchen, and sure wasn’t going to go and try to find his bedroom.

I leaned against the stair railing as I approached it, looking down at what led down into what looked like a pitifully dark corridor. I didn’t like the dark. Not at all. It reminded me of a lot of nasty things that I really didn’t want to think about. I could handle it in Waterfall because I knew it was home…but dark in a place I didn’t know was just…I hated it. It gave me weird, bitter feelings, and made me feel like I’d lost someone that had been important to me.

I made my way down anyway, biting my lip as I stood at the entrance to the incredibly long hallway before me. I didn’t know what I was going to come across, but it certainly wasn’t going to be anything very good. I looked down at the hand that wasn’t holding the spear, focusing my magic on it for a moment. I managed to conjure up a half-functional orb of magic, not quite a spear and not quite anything of substance, but it was enough to let me see where I was going.

I walked down the hallway, my grip on the spear incredibly tight, my knuckles turning a paler shade of blue. I eventually came to the end, and I found myself standing in front of more Capital buildings and another elevator. I wasn’t surprised. If this was the king’s house, it made sense that there would be an incredibly confusing maze of elevators, corners, and buildings hidden underneath.

I walked up to the elevator, reaching my spear up for a button, but it opened automatically, like someone was getting out of it, but I was stopped from doing anything when I felt someone touch my shoulder. I whipped around, only to realize that no one was behind me. I turned around again, frantically, trying to find what had happened.

“Hello?!” I practically screamed, the orb of light in my hands disappearing into the air around me as I posed myself to strike with my spear. “Show yourself!”

Nothing happened. No one was there, but I felt afraid to go in the elevator, afraid to go near it, afraid to even think about entering it again. I had another choice, a different path to walk down. I walked down the hall, landing in one of the most brightly lit rooms I’d ever seen.

It was beautiful, like something taken straight out of the happiest of dreams. I couldn’t help but get the weird feeling that this place wasn’t always going to be something beautiful and trustworthy, though, because places like this never held only happy memories. I walked down the path, looking out the windows at the closest thing to outside we could have in our magic-run cell.

“Wow,” I breathed, poking at the glass. “It’s a beautiful day outside.”

I was alone, so of course, my talking was fruitless. There was no one listening to me. Not that anyone listened to me when I was actually around them, anyway.

I walked down the rest of the beautiful hallway, feeling weird about leaving it behind. I almost didn’t want to. I felt as if I would be safer in there than anywhere else. Like maybe pushing on was a mistake. I kept walking anyway, walking until I was standing in front of a door that…there was noise coming from the other side of the door. The sound of a watering can, the sound of someone humming. Humming the very same thing I had hummed in the CORE earlier.

I stepped into the room, taking a second to look at the flowers and the massive figure before me, his back turned towards me as he tended to the flowers like they were practically his children.

“Hey, king Asgore!” I hollered. Finally! I had finally made it to the king. I could finally fight him!

He turned around and looked at me with probably the gentlest expression I had ever seen on another monster’s face. He looked at me like he thought I was just some silly kid that busted into his palace to play a game. I wasn’t there to play! I wasn’t there to chat about tea or flowers or packages of snails sitting in a refrigerator.

“What can I do for you, young one?” He asked. His voice was warm, deep, and fatherly. The kind of voice I imagined that Gerson would have if he were actually my dad. Or if I actually had a dad.

“Fight me!” I said, narrowing the only eye that wasn’t completely covered by my newfound eyepatch. “I came all the way from Waterfall!”  
“Child, that is an awfully long way to travel, but are you sure y-“  
“Yes, I’m sure! I need to prove that I can fight the king!”

He chuckled.

“Don’t go easy on me, either!” I was unknowingly bouncing on the balls of my feet. I was almost vibrating with anticipation.

“Oh child,” He said. “We should perhaps have some tea or something first, don’t you think? Children should never have to run head first into a fight.”

I had come so far. I wasn’t going to give up after all of this. I ran towards him with my spear out, my feet kicking up a little bit of dirt in the process as I ran. He stepped out of the way easily, but I was yanked backwards. I landed on my butt, my spear slapping onto the ground and rolling across the flowers in the process. I looked up just in time to see a single white hand disappear into thin air. I pushed myself up to my knees, worried, but still eager.

The king, though, looked shocked. He was watching the place where the hand had disappeared.

“Was that…was that your magic, little one?” He asked.  
“No!” I said, unhappy with the amount of fear that permeated my words. “My magic is blue!”  
“Oh dear.”


End file.
